Pepijn van Houwelingen (born 24 February 1980) is a Dutch politician of conservative populist party Forum for Democracy (FvD).

Van Houwelingen has received media attention for several controversial statements with regard to his opposition to globalist ideas and the government's measures to mitigate the COVID-19 pandemic.

[2] Van Houwelingen subsequently did another master's in (philosophy of) economics and another bachelor's in Japanese studies at the same time at Erasmus University Rotterdam.

[1][3] After finishing his studies, Van Houwelingen worked for half a year in demand and supply management at Canon Europe in Amstelveen.

In February 2010, he took a job as a scientific assistant specialized in citizen participation at the Netherlands Institute for Social Research, a government agency, where he remained employed until he became an MP.

[3][5][6] While working at the Netherlands Institute for Social Research, Van Houwelingen voiced his opposition to what he perceived as the growing power of the European Union (EU).

The book's main character argues in favor of city-states, discrimination of minorities, oppression of women, and the abolition of human rights, and he calls the EU the source of many evils.

[3] While a House member, Van Houwelingen argued against scale-ups and mergers in the public sector, and an essay by him about the issue called Microfobie (Microphobia) was published by Forum for Democracy's scientific institute in 2021.

[18] During a legislative meeting in April 2021 about a mandatory quarantine for travelers returning to the Netherlands because of the COVID-19 pandemic, he called the measure totalitarian and compared its reasoning to that of the persecution of Jews during World War II.

When Sjoerd Sjoerdsma (D66) asked him to distance himself from comparisons between measures to limit the spread of the coronavirus and the persecution of Jews, Van Houwelingen told him "Your time will come, because there will be tribunals."

[20][21] Later that day, Speaker of the House Vera Bergkamp wrote that threats and intimidation of any form are completely unacceptable and that she wanted a dialogue with the parliamentary groups about debate manners.

[32] Freek Jansen, who was elected, stepped down in January 2024 to allow Van Houwelingen to help prepare a parliamentary inquiry into COVID-19 as a member of parliament for half a year.